The Barefoot Lawyer: The Remarkable Memoir of China’s Bravest Political Activist - Softcover

Guangcheng, Chen

4.29

426 ratings by Goodreads

9781447243861: The Barefoot Lawyer: The Remarkable Memoir of China’s Bravest Political Activist

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1447243862 ISBN 13: 9781447243861

Publisher: Macmillan, 2015

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It was like a scene out of a thriller: one morning in April 2012, China's most famous political activist-a blind, self-taught lawyer-climbed over the wall of his heavily guarded home and escaped. For days, his whereabouts remained unknown; after he turned up at the American embassy in Beijing, a furious round of high-level negotiations finally led to his release and a new life in the United States.

Chen Guangcheng is a unique figure on the world stage, but his story is even more remarkable than we knew. The son of a poor farmer in rural China, blinded by illness when he was an infant, Chen was fortunate to survive a difficult childhood. But despite his disability, he was determined to educate himself and fight for the rights of his country's poor, especially a legion of women who had endured forced sterilizations under the hated 'one child' policy. Repeatedly harassed, beaten, and imprisoned by Chinese authorities, Chen was ultimately placed under house arrest. After a year of fruitless protest and increasing danger, he evaded his captors and fled to freedom.

With a foreword by the Dalai Lama, this is both a riveting memoir and a revealing portrait of modern China, this passionate book tells the story of a man who has never accepted limits and always believed in the power of the human spirit to overcome any obstacle.

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Review:

Here is China down and dirty, a side of the country rarely, if ever, experienced by foreigners, no matter how knowledgeable or fluent in the language they are...The first pages of this book recount in moving and often exquisite detail - the English translation by Danica Mills reads very well - how Chen, when still a little boy, was guided by his slightly older brothers to touch, stroke and almost see trees, flowers, animals and insects. (Jonathan Mirsky Literary Review)

The book is vital reading for those hoping to understand the struggle of China's disabled people to gain fair treatment, the party's continuing stranglehold on the implementation of the law, and the pressures and compromises involved in human rights negotiations in China [...] Chen's extraordinary tenacity is the keynote of the book. (Julia Lovell Guardian)

From the Author:

Chen Guangcheng is a Chinese civil rights activist now living in the US. In 2007 he was named one of Time magazine's 'Time 100', a list of '100 men and women whose power, talent or moral example is transforming the world'. He is also a laureate of the prestigious Ramon Magsaysay Award, bestowed for 'his irrepressible passion for justice in leading ordinary Chinese citizens to assert their legitimate rights under the law'.

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